Broadway Rose Theatre Company is staging two big musicals this summer. Next month it will be Anything Goes, the classic tuneful and toe-tapping Cole Porter show. But this month the company is branching out through July 20 with Waitress, a contemporary production that reaches beyond traditional expectations about what musicals can be.

Directed by Lyn Cramer, this intriguing, female-centric play, which opened on Broadway in 2016, blends a story about characters who have real-world problems with lyrical storytelling that adds a touch of magical realism to the production. 

This is clear from the very beginning of Waitress, as the sounds of sweet, clear voices are heard around the stage. “Sugar – butter – flour,” they sing as the curtain opens on the quaint Joe’s Diner, located somewhere in the American South, just off Highway 27, where Jenna (Leah Yorkston) is a sublime pie-maker.

Besides creating unique concoctions, she gives her pies names that reflect what’s going on in her life, such as “I Don’t Want Earl’s Baby Pie” and “Deep (Shit) Dish Blueberry Pie.” She’s also a waitress at the diner, where her gruff boss, Cal (Alec J. Connolly) barks orders and her husband, the awful Earl (Mitchell Bray), stops by to take away her hard-earned tips.

Earl, obviously, is not the kind of guy you want to have a baby with. But as Jenna quips to her friends while waiting for the results of a pregnancy test, “I do stupid things when I drink – like sleep with my husband.” 

If you’ve seen Adrienne Shelly’s 2007 movie, which is also called Waitress, you know Earl is both emotionally and physically abusive, and he’s just as nasty on the stage as he was on the screen. We see this not only when he shouts or raises his hand as if to strike Jenna, but also when he snivels that no one has ever loved him before – like that’s a good excuse to hit your wife. The way she hunches her shoulders and shrinks from him on their plaid couch adds an extra layer of menace to his presence.

It’s quite a marvel, then, that this production can make us profoundly uncomfortable while also providing genuine entertainment. Jenna, for example, embarks on an affair with her handsome OB-GYN, which sounds like a bad joke as well as a potential lawsuit. Dr. Pomatter (Benjamin Tissell), though, is kind (the anti-Earl, actually), and when Jenna puts the moves on him, it’s a relief to see her having some fun for once.   

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Far from being simplistic, however, Waitress had me scanning my own general assumptions about musicals and these specific, flawed characters. After all, it’s not clear why the doctor feels compelled to cheat on his spouse with a vulnerable and pregnant patient. At the same time, though, his amorous scenes with Jenna provide some bawdy humor in a musical montage that, in separate scenarios, features a pie and a pair of gynecological stirrups.

It’s ironic how easily this brightly colored show, with swimming-pool blue waitress uniforms and red checked table cloths, embraces the gray areas of being human. When Jenna’s good friend and fellow waitress Becky (Chloe Evans) embarks on an affair of her own, Jenna gets on her high judgmental horse, telling her friend how wrong Becky’s actions are. It’s a rotten but highly recognizable thing to do, and the show, which was created by women (Jessie Nelson based her book on Adrienne Shelly’s film script, and the music and lyrics are by Sara Bareilles), deliberately sidesteps the myth that all female friendships are sugar and spice and unconditional support. 

This realism is beautifully balanced by the production’s many creative touches, such as the fluid movement in the diner (the splendid stylized choreography is by Jeremy Duvall), as well as moments when characters poetically mime stirring pie ingredients, and rolling carts glide like dancing couples across the floor. I especially enjoyed the way the ensemble members are folded into the story, gracefully handing Jenna pie ingredients or nimbly flipping over couch cushions so that she can stash away her tips.

Kristeen Willis’s lighting, too, adds an appealing surreal touch. When Becky defends her affair by singing “I Didn’t Plan It,” the background, which was sky blue, becomes lit with a passionate shade of tangerine. Similarly, the pale green walls of Dr. Pomatter’s exam rooms are transformed to a cloudy pink when he and Jenna are in a clinch.

One thing that isn’t surprising is the talent of this top-notch cast, all of whom are stellar singers as well as agile physical comedians. While I didn’t find the show’s score to be super hummable – and maybe others feel differently – the always-impressive Yorkston and Tissell are mesmerizing, even when simply sitting on a bus-stop bench and singing a duet. It was a delight, too, to see Dan Murphy, Broadway Rose’s founding managing director, in the role of Joe, the owner of the café. With white facial hair resembling Colonel Sanders’ goatee, he turns a ballad about past mistakes into one of the most moving scenes, thanks to a voice that carries echoes of Willie Nelson.

Every aspect of the show – including Billy Thompson’s music direction – is as polished as Broadway Rose fans would expect, and since it’s at the Deb Fennell Auditorium, audiences can enjoy pristine sound, excellent views of the stage, and supremely comfortable seats. My only wish – and this is a compliment, not a complaint – is that I could also see the show at the company’s more intimate New Stage, where everyone would sit a little closer to the action and could savor the details of Sean O’Skea’s set design (like the row of fry pans hanging in the kitchen of Joe’s diner) and the nuanced acting that creates the quirky characters. On the other hand, the big dramatic moments and the broad comedy (particularly Andy Baldwin’s goofy Ogie) read well on the bigger stage.

When the lights went up for intermission, my companion heard a man in front of us say, “Grandma would love this!” – a comment that tickled me as I pictured Jenna and Dr. Pomatter’s antics on the exam table, or the scene where her friend Dawn (Sydney Deputy) is dressed as Betsy Ross with Ogie nestled under her flag.

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I can imagine my grandma would have had a good laugh over those moments, too … while also appreciating the plight of a female character who isn’t perfect, but has enough spirit to land on her feet, even when they’re  aching.

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Waitress continues at the Deb Fennell Auditorium, 9000 S.W. Durham Road in Tigard, through July 20. Find tickets and schedules here.